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Aloha,
On a rainy late summer's eve, the Beamers
gathered to celebrate passage through another book, this one a long and
twisty road where the journey was more than half of the fun. "Kiln
People" by David Brin is a mystery set in a future America that has
nearly unlimited artificial cloning available for everyone, making for
a radically different economy and society. Albert Morris is a
"ditective" (puns feature frequently throughout the book), a profession
he prefers for being less likely to go obsolete. With the ability to
make "dittos" (artificial people who last 24 hours), he is his own
agency, in fact, able to follow up on multiple lines of investigation
by himselves. Wherein lies much of the fun and frustration of the
book, as it switches viewpoint among a variety of Alberts, who, having
different experiences, also have different understandings of the
unfolding solution to the murder of Yosil Maharal, the scientist who
perfected the ditto technology. Brin is able to juggle the different
Alberts rather successfully, most Beamers agreed, but at the price of
having to repeat some of the material to indicate just which Albert is
which in any given scene. Transitions happen rapidly, with chapters
often only 1-3 pages long, especially as the novel reaches its climax.
One
point of contention for us was the central mystery in the book. Some
Beamers appreciated it as an organizing point around which the plot
could unfold (and a plot that involves industrial espionage, multiple
identities/personalities, war as a spectator sport, the quantum nature
of consciousness, time travel, and adds in first contact with aliens as
a throw-away bit can certainly use some focusing). First-time Beamer
Chris found that the pull of solving the mystery was precisely what he
needed to stick with the book as the sf concepts came flying fast and
furious. Jon, on the other hand, disliked the requirement of
misdirection that a mystery adds to a story, particularly when the
solution deflates expectations, akin to a magic trick losing its luster
when it is explained. The issue of misdirection was another discussion
point for us. I offered the idea that Brin layered concepts to take
away the reader's attention to some of the weak points in his
world-building (two of which Juliet questioned, like the significance
of the loosely attached war-as-reality-TV-show and the problem of job
continuity with employees who dissolve between shifts). By introducing
a high-tech mystery involving newer, higher tech trade secrets, Brin
keeps us just off-balanced enough not to consider the shaky
foundations. Jon, however, did not buy the argument, seeing enough
intellectual interest being generated by the concepts of cloning and
personality and ego survival to keep the story afloat without the added
"noise" of the murder mystery. Of course, where he found fascinating
the introduction of multiple personality disorder into a cloning hall
of mirrors is precisely the point at which Kevin saw the story going
over the edge into unbelievability. And that is before we even hit the
cosmic consciousness and time travel sequences.
In
general, we agreed that a significant portion of the book could have
been trimmed in the editing process, as much as 1/3rd according to
Kevin. Juliet pointed to a passage about how vehicles offered
"wrap-around" displays based on a passenger's eye direction that Brin
seems to repeat three times with identical wording. Neat idea, but we
probably get it the first time. Still, the layering of all the
different sf concepts produced a setting and a set of interactions that
Liz found very original and unlike any of our other sf books, even
those with similar concerns for identity transfers. (The parallels of
people moving into new, improved bodies in "Kiln People" and last
month's "Old Man's War" by John Scalzi caught the eyes of several
Beamers, particularly the scene of girlfriend Clara rescuing the
remains of the green-colored ditto Albert/Frankie.) Original as it is,
the book does reference quite a bit of older sf, including many
in-jokes and references to previous works. The sequence of real Albert
disguised as a ditto and exposed to harm, which Chris questioned for
its necessity to the plot, recalls Walter Miller's "The Darfsteller",
an early Hugo Award winner about an actor who sneaks into a robot stage
company at the risk of his character being shot in the last act of the
play. The government-supplied income, the "purple wage", is taken from
the Philip Jose Farmer Hugo winner, "Riders of the Purple Wage",
similarly. With all that, the book makes free use of its borrowed
material and definitely runs its own course with it. Brin is also very
light-hearted with his prose, cramming puns and word play and jokes
into every chapter, particularly in the headers. Whether it helps or
hurts the material to have so much comic material in it we did not
decide. But, as Liz pointed out, Brin cautions against making a
"perfect" world as it would be one that lacked the ingredients for both
tragedy and comedy, which we all agreed would make it less than ideal
for Beamer meetings.
Our
October book is "Pride and Prejudice and Zombies", the updated version
of the Jane Austen classic by Seth Grahame-Smith, now with more
bone-crunching zombie mayhem. For November, we will spiral out into
the galaxy with "Federations", John Joseph Adams's collection of
imperial space operas. In December, we will close out the year with
the first of Kage Baker's Company novels, "In the Garden of Iden",
about time-traveling cyborgs in Tudor England. After the new year
turns, we will be "Beggars in Spain" with Nancy Kress, genetically
modified to give up sleep.
- Eugene, retiring into the late summer night ...
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